Section I What is autonomy? - Pearson HE...

Section

I What is autonomy?

This section will:

• outline the history of autonomy in language learning and identify itssources in the fields of language pedagogy, educational reform, adulteducation, the psychology of learning and political philosophy;

• discuss definitions of autonomy and key issues in research;

• explain why autonomy is a key issue in language education today.

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Chapter 1

The history of autonomy inlanguage learning

1.1 Origins of the concept

Second language acquisition predates institutionalised language learningby many centuries. Even in the modern world millions of individuals con-tinue to learn languages without the aid of formal instruction. Although thereis much that we can learn from their efforts, the theory of autonomy inlanguage learning has been essentially concerned with the organisation offormal education. As such, it has a history of approximately four decades.

Concept 1.1 The origins of autonomy in language learning

The concept of autonomy first entered the field of language teaching throughthe Council of Europe’s Modern Languages Project, established in 1971. Oneof the outcomes of this project was the establishment of the Centre de Rechercheset d’Applications en Langues (CRAPEL) at the University of Nancy, France,which rapidly became a focal point for research and practice in the field. YvesChâlon, the founder of CRAPEL, is considered by many to be the father ofautonomy in language learning. Châlon died at an early age in 1972 and theleadership of CRAPEL was passed to Henri Holec, who remains a prominentfigure within the field of autonomy today. A seminar on self-directed learningand autonomy at the University of Cambridge in December 1976, whichincluded contributions from Philip Riley and Caroline Stanchina of CRAPEL,was also an important foundational event in the field (Harding-Esch, 1977).Holec’s (1981) project report to the Council of Europe is a key early documenton autonomy in language learning. The journal Mélanges Pédagogiques, pub-lished at CRAPEL, has also played an important role in the dissemination ofresearch on autonomy from 1970 to the present day. Important early paperson autonomy from Mélanges Pédagogiques were distributed internationally inRiley’s (1985) collection on Discourse and learning.

According to Gremmo and Riley (1995), interest in the concept ofautonomy within the field of language education was in part a response toideals and expectations aroused by the political turmoil in Europe in thelate 1960s. Holec (1981: 1) began his report to the Council of Europe(Concept 1.1) with a description of the social and ideological contextwithin which ideas of autonomy in learning emerged:

The end of the 1960s saw the development in all so-called industriallyadvanced Western countries of a socio-political tendency characterized by a definition of social progress, no longer in terms of increasing material well-being through an increase in consumer goods and services, but in termsof an improvement in the ‘quality of life’ – an expression that did not becomea slogan until some years later – based on the development of a respect forthe individual in society.

The Council of Europe’s Modern Languages Project aimed to provideadults with opportunities for lifelong learning and the approach developedat CRAPEL was influenced by proposals from the emerging field of adultself-directed learning (Chapter 2.2), which insisted ‘on the need to developthe individual’s freedom by developing those abilities which will enablehim to act more responsibly in running the affairs of the society in whichhe lives’. This connection between education, individual freedom andsocial responsibility also reflected prevailing views of personal autonomy inEuropean and North American political philosophy at the time.

Autonomy, or the capacity to take charge of one’s own learning, was seenas a natural product of the practice of self-directed learning, or learning inwhich the objectives, progress and evaluation of learning are determinedby the learners themselves. Among the key innovations in the CRAPELapproach to the provision of opportunities and support for self-directedlanguage learning were the self-access resource centre and the idea oflearner training. In its early days, the theory and practice of autonomy in language learning also enjoyed an uneasy association with ideas of ‘individualisation’ in language instruction.

1.2 Autonomy and self-access

The first self-access language learning centres, at CRAPEL (Riley andZoppis, 1985) and the University of Cambridge (Harding-Esch, 1982),were based on the idea that access to a rich collection of second languagematerials would offer learners the best opportunity for experimentationwith self-directed learning (Quote 1.1). The provision of counselling ser-vices and an emphasis on authentic materials were also important elementsin the CRAPEL approach.

TEACHING AND RESEARCHING AUTONOMY10

THE HISTORY OF AUTONOMY IN LANGUAGE LEARNING 11

Quote 1.1 Riley and Zoppis on the Sound and Video Library at CRAPEL

If one of our initial aims was to make sure that the Sound and Video Library wouldactually be able to take in all its potential users for as long as possible each week,we also wanted it to be a place where we would apply some of the peda-gogical principles and strategies we firmly believe in. Foremost among thesewas the principle of autonomous learning for advanced and fairly advancedstudents. In our view, students who have reached a certain level in English canimprove their listening comprehension, their oral expression or their writtencomprehension by regularly working in semi-autonomy with adequately preparedteaching material or in complete autonomy using ‘raw’ authentic material.

Riley and Zoppis (1985: 287)

At CRAPEL, self-access was seen as a means of facilitating self-directedlearning. In recent years, however, self-access language learning centreshave proliferated to the point where ‘self-access language learning’ is oftentreated as a synonym for self-directed or autonomous learning. In manyinstitutions, self-access centres have been established without any strongpedagogical rationale and it is often assumed, without any strongjustification, for the assumption that self-access work will automaticallylead to autonomy. To a lesser extent, the producers of self-instructional and distance learning materials have assumed that autonomy will be oneoutcome of these modes of learning. One of the important lessons of thespread of self-access over the past three decades, however, is that there is no necessary relationship between self-instruction and the developmentof autonomy and that, under certain conditions, self-instructional modesof learning may even inhibit autonomy (Chapter 8).

Because self-access centres have been enthusiastic consumers of educationaltechnologies, self-access learning has also tended to become synonymouswith technology-based learning. Within the field of computer-assisted language learning, especially, autonomy has become an important issue. Asin the case of self-access, however, researchers on autonomy emphasisethat learners who engage in technology-based learning do not necessarilybecome more autonomous as a result of their efforts. A great deal dependson the nature of the technology and the use that is made of it (Chapter 9).

1.3 Autonomy and learner training

Like self-access, learner training began life as a mechanism to support self-directed learning (Dickinson and Carver, 1980; Holec, 1980). At CRAPEL,it was argued that in order to carry out effective self-directed learning, adult

learners would need to develop skills related to self-management, self-monitoring and self-assessment. Learners who were accustomed toteacher-centred education would also need to be psychologically preparedfor more learner-centred modes of learning. According to Holec, teachinglearners how to carry out self-directed learning would be counterproduc-tive, since the learning would by definition no longer be self-directed.Instead, learners needed to train themselves (Quote 1.2). Although learnersmight draw on the support of counsellors, teachers or other learners, theimportant thing about learner training was that it should be based on thepractice of self-directed learning itself. Self-direction was understood asthe key to learning languages and to learning how to learn languages.


Quote 1.2 Holec on learner training

The basic methodology for learner training should be that of discovery; thelearner should discover, with or without the help of other learners or teachers,the knowledge and the techniques which he needs as he tries to find theanswers to the problems with which he is faced. By proceeding largely by trialand error he trains himself progressively.

Holec (1980: 42)

As the practice of learner training became more widespread in the 1980sand 1990s it increasingly drew upon insights from research on learningstrategies, which aimed to identify the behaviours and strategies used bysuccessful learners and train less successful learners in their use. Althoughthe idea of autonomy did not initially have a strong influence on learnerstrategies research, Wenden (1991) made the link explicit in the title of herbook, Learner Strategies for Learner Autonomy. Like self-access, learnertraining has also taken on a life of its own in recent years. While most prac-titioners in the field see learner training as leading to greater autonomy,learner training is no longer confined to self-directed learning. Dickinson(1992), for example, views learner training as a resource to help learners toengage more actively in classroom learning, and some of the best learnertraining materials have been developed for classroom use (Chapter 10).

1.4 Autonomy and individualisation

Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, autonomy was closely associated withindividualisation, an association evident in the titles of collections thatlinked the two fields (Altman and James, 1980; Brookes and Grundy, 1988;Geddes and Sturtridge, 1982). Brookes and Grundy (1988: 1), for example,


Quote 1.3 Riley on autonomy and individualisation

Individualisation (‘individualised learning’, ‘individualised instruction’) is, his-torically at least, linked with programmed learning and based on a thoroughlybehaviouristic psychology. As it is generally practised, it leaves very little free-dom of choice to the individual learner. Rather it is the teacher who tries toadapt his methodology and materials to the learner, like a doctor writing outa prescription. That is, the majority of the relevant decisions are made for thelearner, not by him. It is in fact individualised TEACHING: it aims at the mostefficient use of the teacher and at the most effective result, but in terms ofwhat the teacher wants the learner to achieve.

Riley (1986: 32)

suggested in the introduction to their collection of papers on individualis-ation and autonomy that the two were linked to each other through theidea of learner-centredness:

One corollary of learner-centredness is that individualization will assumegreater importance, as will the recognition of the autonomy of the learner asthe ultimate goal.

Individualisation and autonomy overlapped in as much as both were concerned with meeting the needs of individual learners. Self-directedlearning as it was practised at CRAPEL was thus in a sense a form of individualisation, in which learners determined their own needs and actedupon them. As the practice of self-access spread, self-access resource centres were also seen as performing important functions in the individu-alisation of learning.

Individualisation also took the form of programmed learning – a modeof instruction in which learners were expected to work their way, at theirown pace, through materials prepared by teachers. From the outset,researchers at CRAPEL took pains to distinguish self-directed learningfrom programmed individualised learning on the grounds that the latterleft the most important decisions in learning to the teacher rather than tothe learner. Holec (1981: 6) also made a distinction between teaching thattakes the learner into consideration and learning that is directed by thelearners themselves:

In a general way the extent to which the learner is taken into considerationforms no criterion for judging the extent to which learning is self-directed:individualization effected by taking into account the learner’s needs, hisfavourite methods of learning, his level, and so on, leave the learner in thetraditional position of dependency and do not allow him to control his learn-ing for himself.

Riley (1986) also argued that programmed learning deprived learners ofthe freedom of choice essential to the development of autonomy (Quote 1.3).


The early association of autonomy with individualisation may also belargely responsible for the widespread criticism that autonomy implieslearners studying languages in isolation from teachers and from each other.This criticism was more difficult to counter since it must be acknowledgedthat, although collaborative programmes for self-directed groups of learners have been designed at CRAPEL and elsewhere, much of the earlywork in the field of autonomy focused on the learner as an individual withdistinct characteristics and needs. In recent years, however, researchers onautonomy have emphasised that the development of autonomy necessarilyimplies collaboration and interdependence.

1.5 Autonomy and interdependence

It is evident in retrospect that the concept of autonomy in language learn-ing had, by the late 1980s, begun to suffer something of a crisis of identity.Holec (1985a) continued to emphasise that autonomy should be used todescribe a capacity of the learner, but others began to use it to refer to situations in which learners worked under their own direction outside theconventional language-teaching classroom. Riley and Zoppis (1985: 287),for example, described learners working in a self-access centre as workingin ‘semi-autonomy’ or ‘complete autonomy’. Dickinson (1987: 11) definedautonomy as ‘the situation in which the learner is totally responsible for allof the decisions concerned with his learning and the implementation of thosedecisions’. He also used the term ‘full autonomy’ to describe the situationin which the learner is entirely independent of teachers, institutions or specially prepared materials. Although there is now consensus within thefield that autonomy best refers to the capacity to control or take charge ofone’s learning, the term ‘autonomous learning’ is still used to refer to thesituation of studying without the direct presence of a teacher, especially inthe literature on learning beyond the classroom.

Researchers on autonomy were aware that in order to develop a capac-ity to take control of their learning, learners needed to be freed from thedirection and control of others. At the same time, they were well awarethat learners who chose, or were forced by circumstances, to study languages in isolation from teachers and other learners, would not neces-sarily develop this capacity. However, the argument that the opportunityto exercise autonomy through self-directed learning was a necessary pre-condition for the development of autonomy was interpreted by critics as an argument that it was a sufficient condition. Moreover, the theory andpractice of autonomy had, in a sense, become framed within the practice of individualised self-directed learning, and was seen by many as beingirrelevant to classroom learning. The use of the term independence as a

synonym for autonomy by some researchers also led critics to view thefield of autonomy as one in which crucial questions concerning the socialcharacter of learning are avoided (Concept 1.2).


Concept 1.2 Independence, dependence and interdependence

A number of researchers, in the United Kingdom and Australia especially,have preferred the term independence to autonomy, creating two terms forwhat is essentially the same concept. When independence is used as a synonymof autonomy, its opposite is dependence, which implies excessive reliance onthe direction of teachers or teaching materials. One problem with the use ofthis term, however, is that it can also be understood as the opposite of inter-dependence, which implies working together with teachers and other learnerstowards shared goals. Many researchers would argue that autonomy doesimply interdependence. For this reason, the term independence is avoided inthis book.

The theory and practice of autonomy escaped from this crisis of identity largely through the efforts of practitioners who experimented withthe idea of autonomy in classroom settings (Chapter 11). Their work wasinfluenced in part by developing views of the classroom as a ‘social context’for learning and communication (Breen, 1986; Breen and Candlin, 1980)and the idea that autonomy could be developed by a shift in relationshipsof power and control within the classroom. Some of the most influentialwork in this area was carried out by Leni Dam and her colleagues in Danishsecondary schools, where autonomy developed through negotiation of curriculum and classroom tasks (Dam, 1995). This work, which developedout of a collaborative in-service teacher education project with theUniversity of Lancaster (Breen et al., 1989), had a considerable influenceon later innovations, prompting a shift in the focus of research towardsclassroom practice and teachers’ own autonomy.

One of the most challenging developments in the theory of auton-omy in the 1990s was the idea that autonomy implies interdependence.Kohonen (1992: 19) argued the point forcefully:

Personal decisions are necessarily made with respect to social and moralnorms, traditions and expectations. Autonomy thus includes the notion ofinterdependence, that is being responsible for one’s own conduct in thesocial context: being able to cooperate with others and solve conflicts in constructive ways.

Collaborative decision making within cooperative learning groups wasthus a key feature of Kohonen’s ‘experiential’ model for the developmentof autonomy. Little (1996: 211) also argued that collaboration is essential

to the development of autonomy as a psychological capacity, stating that‘the development of a capacity for reflection and analysis, central to thedevelopment of learner autonomy, depends on the development and internalization of a capacity to participate fully and critically in social inter-actions’. Such statements provided a corrective to the earlier emphasis onthe individual working outside the classroom. They also provided a focusfor research and practice on the reform of the conventional classroom to support the development of autonomy (see also Breen, 2001; Kohonenet al., 2000).


Quote 1.4 Little on teacher autonomy

. . . since learning arises from interaction and interaction is characterized byinterdependence, the development of autonomy in learners presupposes thedevelopment of autonomy in teachers.

Little (1995: 175)

The idea of interdependence in the classroom was also developedthrough work on teacher autonomy (see Chapter 13). In this work, theinterdependence at issue is between learners and teachers and some havegone so far as to suggest that the development of learner autonomy isdependent on teacher autonomy (Quote 1.4). Although a strong case canbe made for this argument in classroom contexts, the implication that thedevelopment of learner autonomy presupposes classroom learning remainsproblematic. There is also the difficulty of separating learner–teacherinterdependence from learner dependence upon teachers. Nevertheless,current interest in the idea of teacher autonomy reflects the degree towhich learner autonomy is now viewed as a socially and institutionally contextualised construct.

In place of a simplistic dichotomy between autonomous learning andinstructed learning, we now have a more complex view of autonomy as the outcome of a range of education processes. This view involves greaterattention to classroom learning and teacher education. At the same time,there has been continued attention to out-of-class and out-of-school settings,especially self-access, distance learning and technology-based learning(Chapters 8 and 9). Within a broadly social understanding of learnerautonomy, there has also been renewed interest in learner individuality in qualitative investigations of the long-term development of autonomy in individual language learning careers (Benson and Nunan, 2002, 2005;Kalaja, Barcelos and Menezes, 2008).

1.6 Why autonomy? Why now?

In the course of its evolution, the concept of autonomy has become part ofthe mainstream of research and practice within the field of language edu-cation. This is in part due to the reported success of numerous projectsassociated with autonomy and the efforts of those who have advocatedautonomy as a goal of education. However, it would be a mistake to assumethat autonomy has entered the mainstream of language education inde-pendently of social and economic factors that have made language educatorsand funding authorities more open to the practices associated with it(Concept 1.3).


Concept 1.3 Autonomy in policy and practice

As part of its collaborative work on autonomy in language learning, theEuroPAL project has published data on autonomy in the education and language education policies of seven European countries: Bulgaria, Cyprus,England, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden (Miliander and Trebbi, 2008).Policies in all seven countries were supportive of autonomy, with Norwayhaving the mostly strongly articulated policies on paper. An extract from theNorwegian National Common Core Curriculum for primary and secondaryschools reads:

Education shall provide learners with the capability to take charge of themselvesand their lives, as well as with the vigour and will to stand by others. [Education]must teach the young to look ahead and train their ability to make soundchoices, allow each individual to learn by observing the practical consequencesof his or her choices, and foster means and manners, which facilitate theachievement of the results they aim at. The young must gradually shouldermore responsibility for the planning and achievement of their own education –and they must take responsibility for their own conduct and behaviour. (Citedin Trebbi, 2008b: 42)

An extract from the French as a second foreign language curriculum forlower secondary reads:

The learning task will enable pupils to discover and explore the language, to useit right from the start, and through their own use of it gradually systematizetheir discoveries and try out their knowledge of the language. The pupils’ evaluation of their own texts, and of the actual work process, helps them gaininsight into their own language learning. (Cited in Trebbi, 2008b: 45)

But Trebbi, who has been involved in projects on autonomy in northernEurope since the 1980s, also cites extracts from a Council of Europe Experts’Report on language education policy in Norway, which indicate that progresstowards learner autonomy has been limited, with many teachers adhering totraditional ways of teaching languages. She suggests that this is partly due to

The more complex view of autonomy that now characterises the fieldreflects the range of contexts in which it is now discussed and applied. Thisin turn reflects the development of a much wider interest in the idea ofautonomy in language education. The number of publications on autonomyin language learning appearing since the turn of the century is an indicatorof the growth of autonomy as a specialised field of inquiry. The inclusionof sections on autonomy in more general guides to language teaching, onthe other hand, is a sign of a somewhat more diffuse interest in autonomywithin the field (Cameron, 2001; Harmer, 2001; Hedge, 2000). In theseworks learner autonomy is presented less as a specialised educational con-cept, and more as an idea that is likely to form part of language teachers’conceptual toolkit. Research on autonomy in the field of language educa-tion has no doubt contributed to language teachers’ knowledge of the concept and its applications, but Cameron’s account of the relevance of autonomy to young learners (Quote 1.5) points to a broader sense ofautonomy as a ‘good thing’ that comes from outside this field. Cameronalso touches upon a widespread feeling that, in spite of being a ‘goodthing’, autonomy may also be imposed on language learners by the realities of a changing world. Teachers may also feel that they are oftenpresented with the problem of making autonomy work in settings to whichit is not always transparently relevant.


ambiguities within the policy: for example, in addition to stating that pupilsshould ‘build up their knowledge, generate their skills and evolve their attitudes largely by themselves’, the Core Curriculum states that ‘the courseof study must identify what the learners should be familiar with, in whatorder and at which level’. She also notes a ‘double-binding strategy’, in whichlearners are expected to take responsibility for their learning regardless ofwhether the activities are self-directed or teacher-directed (p. 49). In spite of these limitations, Trebbi points out that many schools are experimentingwith new ways of grouping students, flexible timetables, new subject content,independent study time, learning-to-learn schemes, portfolio-based assess-ment, and counselling.

Quote 1.5 Lynne Cameron on autonomy and young learners

It is commonly recognised in today’s world that autonomous and self-regulatedlearners will be at an advantage in continuing to learn and adjust throughouttheir lives as technology and information develop rapidly and continuously.Learner autonomy then is ‘a good thing’ and to be encouraged, but how realistic is this in classes of five year olds? My own view is that we tend to


Much of this book is concerned with evidence that autonomy can bemade to work in a variety of settings. In this section, however, I want tolook briefly at five aspects of the broader contexts of educational and socialchange that have both favoured the spread of interest in autonomy andproblematised its role in the theory and practice of language teaching andlearning: the changing landscape of language teaching and learning, theglobalisation of educational policy, changing assumptions about the natureof work and competence, the rise of self-improvement culture, and chang-ing conceptions of social and personal identity.

Allwright (1988: 35) summed up the view of many in the late 1980s,when he wrote that autonomy was ‘associated with a radical restructuringof pedagogy, a restructuring that involves the rejection of the traditionalclassroom and the introduction of wholly new ways of working’. In retro-spect, however, we can see that, for reasons having relatively little to dowith those who were advocating autonomy, the restructuring of languagepedagogy around innovations such as self-access, distance learning, infor-mation technology and blended learning were already underway in the late1980s and have only gathered pace since. The impetus behind these pro-cesses has come both from the exponential growth since the early 1960s inthe number of language learners, especially English language learners,worldwide and a global trend towards the reduction of per capita costs oflanguage education. It is not only economies of scale that have made inno-vations associated with autonomy attractive to governments and institu-tions, however, but also the diversity that has accompanied growth instudent numbers. As education providers find it increasingly difficult topredict the needs of the heterogeneous populations of students under theircharge, it makes good sense to offer students choices and a degree of inde-pendence. Where more traditional approaches prevail, as they do in manyprimary and secondary school systems around the world, there is often anunderlying, if questionable, assumption of a homogeneous student bodyand a common purpose for language learning. Recent reviews of languageeducation policy in East Asia, however, also show how increased Englishlanguage provision in schools has been accompanied by a shift towardscommunicative and task-based approaches to classroom learning and theuse of self-access and CALL facilities (Ho, 2004; Nunan, 2003).

underestimate the potential for self-regulation in our children, seeing them toooften as blank sheets to be written on, empty vessels to be filled, or wild andin need of taming since learning arises from interaction and interaction is characterized by interdependence, the development of autonomy in learnerspresupposes the development of autonomy in teachers.

Cameron (2001: 235)


In these respects, language teaching is possibly a step ahead of other sub-ject areas, but in recent years broader education policies have also begun tofavour experiments in autonomy in certain respects. The well-documentedtendency towards the globalisation of educational policy, leading to increa-singly homogeneous national policies, has been an important factor in this(Block and Cameron, 2002; Mundy, 2005; Wiseman and Baker, 2005).Within the framework of globalised policy, the development of the indi-vidual has become a central concern. According to Mundy (2005: 8), edu-cational convergence in the late twentieth century ‘helped produce a worldculture that embedded such common ideas and institutions as citizenship,equality, individualism and progress in territorially defined nation–states’.Wiseman and Baker (2005: 8) note how this has largely been a process ofexporting Western assumptions to other parts of the world. Driven by theeconomic principle that the education of individuals can influence nationaleconomic growth and has contributed significantly to the economic develop-ment of nations, the Western ‘myth of the individual’ as the source of valueand change has come to provide the model framework for schoolingaround the world. The extent to which principles of learner autonomy havebeen built into language education policy has been less well-documented,although data has now been published on seven European countries(Miliander and Trebbi, 2008) (Concept 1.3) and policy initiatives havebeen described in China (Shao and Wu, 2007), Thailand (Akaranithi andPunlay, 2007) and Japan (Head, 2006). On the evidence of these reports,national policies favouring student-centred language learning are to befound in many parts of the world. Such policies create a favourable climateof discourse for experiments in autonomy, but such experiments can alsobe discouraged by economic assumptions about the costs of education andthe nature of teaching, which have led to increased workloads and a nar-rowing of focus of teachers’ work to the delivery of mandated curricula andassessment of students’ work (Lamb, 2008; Smith, 2006).

As Ecclestone (2002) notes in the context of vocational education, poli-cies favouring autonomy are often driven by the view that investment inthe education of individuals offers the best chance of economic survival fornations ‘at risk’ from the forces of globalisation. This reasoning, however,is also linked to broader views of the nature of work and competency in so-called ‘post-industrial’ or ‘new capitalist’ economies. The new capitalism,it is argued, is primarily based on services and knowledge work and, in theface of rapid technological change, generic skills, flexibility and the abilityto learn how to learn are at a premium. Gee (2004) describes the kinds ofindividuals favoured by the new capitalism as ‘shape-shifting portfolio people’, who must constantly be ready to rearrange their portfolios of skills,experiences, and achievements creatively in order to define themselves ascompetent and worthy (Quote 1.6). This image will, no doubt, resonate

with anyone who works in a post-industrial economy, and perhaps especiallyso with language teachers, who are now not only surrounded by discourseson the qualities of graduates that are preferred by new capitalist employers,but are required to manifest these qualities in their increasingly insecureprofessional lives. Again these changes have created favourable climates ofdiscourse for experiments in autonomy, while also creating the risk thatsuch experiments will be seen as harnessing educational goals to newlyconceptualised needs of employers.


Quote 1.6 Gee on shape-shifting portfolio people

Shape-shifting portfolio people are people who see themselves in entrepreneurialterms. That is, they see themselves as free agents in charge of their own selvesas if those selves were projects or businesses. They believe they must managetheir own risky trajectories through building up a variety of skills, experiences, andachievements in terms of which they can define themselves as successful nowand worthy of more success later. Their set of skills, experiences, and achieve-ments, at any one time, constitutes their portfolio. However, they must alsostand ready and able to rearrange these skills, experiences, and achievementscreatively (that is, to shape-shift into different identities) in order to definethemselves anew (as competent and worthy) for changed circumstances.Gee (2004: 105)

The idea of the self as ‘project’ is also prevalent within the self-improvement culture that has now begun to invade so many aspects of every-day life in post-industrial societies. For Cameron (2002) self-improvementculture comprises a range of practices and text-types, including self-help andpopular psychology books, and ‘confessional’ TV shows on which peopletalk out their experiences, problems and feelings in public (Quote 1.7). Tothese we might add practices and text-types concerned with personalhealth and safety, diet and physical fitness, beauty and bodily improve-ment, body decoration and modification, and mental well-being. Informaladult foreign language learning, at evening classes or using broadcastmedia, can also be considered part of this self-improvement culture, especi-ally where there is an intention to use foreign language for work or travel,but also where it is seen simply as a form of personal development.Cameron, however, focuses more on the general importance of ‘com-munication skills’ within self-improvement culture – an importance thatreflects their role as a recognised qualification for employment in new capitalist economies.


Quote 1.7 Deborah Cameron on self-improvement culture

What I am calling ‘self-improvement culture’ comprises a range of practicesand text-types focusing on the individual and her or his relationships with others, and particularly on the problems of modern personal life. Among the most accessible expressions of this culture are self-help and popular psychology books, and broadcast talk shows of the ‘confessional’ type where people talk about their experiences, problems and feelings, sometimes receiving advice from an expert (a therapist, counsellor or psychologist). Largenumbers of people are at least occasional consumers of this kind of material,and it is so ubiquitous in contemporary popular culture that it is difficult foranyone to remain entirely unfamiliar with it.

(Cameron, 2002: 74)

Lastly, a somewhat different kind of concern with the self has been documented in recent interdisciplinary research on global mobility andidentity that has problematised the traditional view that identities are fixedby circumstances of birth and upbringing (Bauman, 2004; Giddens, 1991;Hannerz, 1996). Often described as ‘post-structuralist’, this research arguesthat processes of mobility and displacement associated with globalisationare obliging individuals to take more and more responsibility for the con-struction of their own identities, albeit under certain social and culturalconstraints. It has also been argued that self-narratives play an importantrole in this new ‘identity work’: our identities are increasingly framedwithin the stories that we tell about our lives (Giddens, 1991).

For individuals who learn and use a second language, this kind of identity work may be especially important. Engagement with a second language inevitably destabilises first language identities and provokesreconstruction of the individual’s sense of self to accommodate the fact of learning and using a second language. It has also been observed that sustained experiences of language learning involving mobility can enhancethe individuality of the learner’s sense of identity (Benson, Chik and Lim,2003). The idea that language learning involves identity work has begun to play an increasingly important role in language education research,especially in post-structuralist studies in which language identities areviewed as multiple, fragmented and dynamic (Block, 2007; Norton, 2000).From this perspective, autonomy, or an ongoing sense of being in controlof one’s own identity to some degree, could be viewed as the glue thatholds identities together. Straub, Zielke and Werbik (2005), for example,have adopted this point of view, arguing that autonomy is not grounded

in substantive pre-existing identities, but in identities that become individualised over time through self-thematisation and self-narrative(Chapter 2.4.1).

To sum up, developments in the landscape of language education, educational policy and broader economic and cultural environments haveconverged in recent years to create a climate that favours a growth of interest in autonomy in language learning. While it would seem churlishfor advocates of autonomy not to welcome this growth of interest, it has nevertheless been viewed as somewhat problematic, in part, becauseautonomy no longer seems to be an incontrovertibly ‘good thing’ in edu-cation (Hand, 2006; Olssen, 2005).

1.7 The two faces of autonomy

Early experiments in self-directed learning and autonomy drew sustenancefrom the social and ideological changes of their times. Gremmo and Riley(1995) suggest that the rise of autonomy corresponded to an ideologicalshift away from consumerism and materialism towards an emphasis on themeaning and value of personal experience, quality of life, personal freedomand minority rights. In higher education, the notion of ‘student power’ wascurrent (Cockburn and Blackburn, 1970), and radically student-centrededucational reforms were being proposed by Freire (1970), Illich (1971),Rogers (1969) and others. Advocates of autonomy who come from thiscountercultural tradition are, therefore, liable to be somewhat sceptical ofthe ways that learner autonomy is now represented in educational andsocial discourse, not so much because these are diluted representations, butmore because of a sense that the idea of autonomy is being coopted to pro-posals that fail to problematise the idea of education as a means to preparestudents for the world of work.

The problem that research needs to address is, perhaps, the inherentambiguity in the assumption that autonomy in learning is a good thing for all concerned. Have economic, social and educational systems acrossthe world really changed to such an extent that we need no longer think ofautonomy in terms of a shift in the balance of power towards learners?Have the interests of students, educational systems and employers in thenew capitalist economies really converged to such an extent that we nolonger need to tease out pedagogies that serve the interests of studentsfrom pedagogies that produce the kinds of graduates that employers aredeemed to require?



Concept 1.4 Autonomy and employability

In an important contribution to the literature on educational reform inEngland, Bentley (1998) directly links ‘active learning’ and ‘learning beyondthe classroom’ to concerns about the ‘employability’ of young people. Bentleyshows how ‘the role of education in developing employability has graduallycome into focus, and educationalists and employers have moved towardseach other, building closer partnerships, developing a common language,and seeking ways to achieve shared goals’ (p. 99). One of the major obstaclesto reform, he argues, is the ‘separation of different perspectives on the sameproblem, and the lack of communication and mutual understanding betweenschools, parents, employers and pupils over a set of goals which are commonto all’ (p. 106). While Bentley favours greater learner autonomy, his assump-tion of a common set of interests among educational stakeholders appears toundermine the principle of learners making key decisions about their learn-ing, rather than following what schools, parents and employers deem to betheir best interests.

While schools clearly have a broad responsibility to prepare students for future employment, the risk in arguments for autonomy in learningbased on employability is that it will become difficult to conceptualise the educational value of autonomy in anything other than economic terms(Concept 1.4). Broader social visions of education contributing to the for-mation of democratic communities of self-determined individuals are alsoliable to be erased in favour of a much narrower vision of the harnessing ofeducational goals to the requirements of employers. Addressing these concerns does not necessarily imply an explicitly oppositional approach tolanguage education. It does imply, however, that concerns about the goals ofeducation should not be divorced from the practice of teaching and learning.Fostering autonomy requires, above all, a focus on the learners’ perspectivesin regard to goals and processes. As Holec (1985a: 182) argues:

Providing yourself with the means to undertake your own learning pro-gramme presupposes that, at the very least, you think it is possible to be both‘producer’ and ‘consumer’ of such a programme. This runs counter to theusual attitudes of members of our modern consumer society; indeed for theindividual it means withdrawing from it to some extent, since the usual pro-cedure for acquiring ‘goods’ (in this case competence in a foreign language)is not a creative one.

Although the idea of autonomy in learning currently appears to be in har-mony with the needs of new capitalist economies and with other social andcultural trends, it does not arise from them, nor is it dependent upon them.Fostering learner autonomy remains a matter of allowing the interests oflearners to emerge and take priority, rather than one of meeting the

interests of those who require their skills. The more difficult issue, how-ever, is to separate out these two kinds of interests in both theoretical andpractical work.


Quote 1.8 Pennycook on the ‘psychologisation’ of autonomy

The idea of autonomy has therefore moved rapidly from a more marginal andpolitically engaged concept to one in which questions are less and less com-monly asked about the larger social or educational aims of autonomy. Broaderpolitical concerns about autonomy are increasingly replaced by concernsabout how to develop strategies for learner autonomy. The political hasbecome the psychological.

Pennycook (1997: 41)

Placing this argument in the context of language education, there is cur-rently a global trend for education providers to see language skills as aform of economic capital. As language educators respond to this trend,there is a risk that the focus in work on autonomy will shift away fromlearner control over the goals, purposes and long-term direction of language learning to the development of the learning-to-learn skills thatunderpin a capacity for control over learning (Quote 1.8). AlthoughPennycook may overstate the extent to which this is characteristic ofresearch on autonomy itself, there is justifiable concern that the freedomsimplied by learner autonomy are being reduced to consumer choices.Little (2007: 2) also has argued that learner autonomy is now ‘often under-stood to entail nothing more than allowing learners choice – not necessarilyan open choice, but the opportunity to select from two or three alternativesoffered by the teacher’. It is mainly in relation to this reduced form that theemphasis on autonomy in language education has been questioned (Holliday,2003, 2005; Pennycook, 1997; Schmenk, 2005; Sonaiya, 2002). This ques-tioning has also led to a number of attempts to identify ‘stronger’ and‘weaker’ approaches to the theory and practice of autonomy (Chapter 3).

Section I What is autonomy? - Pearson HE...

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